Rudy Giuliani’s foreign policy positions draw new scrutiny

Rudy Giuliani is reportedly a leading contender to be named President-elect Donald Trump’s Secretary of State — the country’s top diplomat and the president’s chief foreign affairs advisor.

While secretaries of state generally have previous military or foreign policy experience, Giuliani’s global perspectives mainly involve his lucrative work as a lawyer and international security consultant, and his service as New York City’s mayor from 1994 to 2001.

Here are some of Giuliani’s most notable foreign policy positions, partnerships and entanglements as he’s considered for Secretary of State.

‘Until the war is over, anything is legal’

Speaking on ABC’s “This Week” in September, Giuliani advocated for U.S. ground forces to remain in the Middle East to oversee the region’s oil as a means of undercutting ISIS terrorists.

Host George Stephanopoulos questioned him on the legality of the tactic.

“Of course it’s legal. It’s a war. Until the war is over, anything is legal,” Giuliani said. “That oil becomes a very critical issue. First of all, if that oil wasn’t there, we wouldn’t have the Islamic State. So when (Trump) says thing like, Obama and Hillary were the founder of the Islamic State, he doesn’t mean literally that. He follows it by saying, they would get the MVP award. That oil is what makes the Islamic State so rich.”

Rudy Giuliani served as New York City’s mayor from 1994 to 2001.

(Evan Vucci/AP)

Who needs congress?

Giuliani, appearing on CNN in February 2014, suggested that President Obama should have bypassed congress and bombed Syria.

‘That is what you call a leader’

While Giuliani has spent years blasting President Obama, he has gone out of his way to credit Russia President Vladimir Putin.

“Putin decides what he wants to do and he does it in half-a-day,” Giuliani told Fox News’ Neil Cavuto in 2014. “Right? He decided he had to go to their parliament. He went to their parliament. He got permission in 15 minutes … He makes a decision and he executes it quickly. Then everybody reacts. That is what you call a leader.”

Gas guzzler

Giuliani’s law firm raked in hundreds of thousands of dollars during the mid-2000s by lobbying American lawmakers on behalf of Citgo Petroleum Corp., the American subsidiary of Petroleos de Venezuela — the Venezuelan oil company controlled by president Hugo Chavez.

Chavez, a major critic of America, at the time called President Bush “the devil.”

17 photos view gallery

Donald Trump’s road to the White House as President-elect

Making Mexico great again, also

In 2003, after Giuliani left office as New York City’s mayor, he visited Mexico City — touring the city’s tough slums in a guarded jeep following an invitation by multibillionaire Carlos Slim and politician Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.

The officials wanted Giuliani to bring his “zero tolerance” strategy south of the border.

The visit — and subsequent recommendations — came with a multimillion dollar price tag.

“They’re spending $ 4 million on this fancy study,” Mario Vargas, a cop of 15 years, told the Daily News at the time. “Why don’t they use that money to create more jobs so that the kids have something better to do than cause trouble?”

While the Giuliani Group’s suggestions helped Mexico City improve on some crime measures, critics noted that a focus on arrest quotas and “broken windows” policing didn’t necessarily improve safety — and left some groups such as street vendors in harm’s way.

Money makes the world go ’round

In 2011, an Iranian exile group called the Mujahedin e-Khalq, or People’s Holy Warriors, paid Giuliani tens of thousands of dollars for a speech — in efforts to get the group removed from the State Department’s terrorist list, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Rudy Giuliani speaks with NBC’s Tim Russert during a 2007 episode of “Meet the Press.”

(Alex Wong/Getty Images for Meet the Press)

Giuliani’s opinion quickly shifted on the group, which was once allied with Saddam Hussein.

“We shouldn’t just de-list the MeK; we should applaud them,” Giuliani told the Washington crowd, according to the report. “We should join with them, we’re on the same side.”

Outta here

The White House was miffed with then-Mayor Giuliani in 1995 after he booted Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat from a concert at Lincoln Center, citing the Palestinian Liberation Organization’s terrorism ties.

Diplomats and former mayors criticized Giuliani, but Rudy defended his actions — saying he would not invite Arafat to “anything, anywhere, anytime, anyplace.”

Drill, China, drill

In 2008, Giuliani spouted off a widely debunked myth about China drilling off Cuban shores. Fresh off a failed bid for the Republican presidential nomination, the New Yorker claimed the Asian country was drilling close to the Florida shore, in area U.S. environmental laws forbids American from touching.

Giuliani has voiced support for Russia President Vladimir Putin.

(POOL/REUTERS)

“Cuba is going to allow China to drill for oil within 80 miles of Florida,” he told Glenn Beck. “And Florida had a 300-mile limit. So in essence, we have China drilling for American oil.”

Giuliani repeated the rumor in an attempt to advocate for American drilling just off of its own shores.

A Chinese rig eventually tested the area, drilling three wells in hopes of striking black gold — but all of them came up dry and the Chinese abandoned the plan.

Ties to Qatar questioned

Giuliani guided New York City amid the 9/11 attacks and its aftermath — and years later, his private security firm had business dealings with a government minister suspected of harboring one of the terrorists involved with the attacks.

“The reality is that Qatar is an ally of the United States. There are a significant number of American troops that are stationed in Qatar. What we did for them and do for them is security for their facilities, and this is a country that is an ally of ours in the Middle East to the extent that it has a very significant number of American troops stationed there,” Giuliani said.

“So the reality is that we need to develop friends — we need to develop friends in the Middle East. We need to develop friendships with the Emirates, we need to develop friendships with Qatar, with Kuwait. These are countries that we have to get closer to — we should trade more with them, we should be involved more with them as we stand up to Islamic terrorism.”

Despite his own connections with countries such as Qatar, Giuliani was quick to criticize Hillary Clinton’s foreign ties during the 2016 presidential race.

Place your bets

Giuliani’s law firm raked in hundreds of thousands of dollars during the mid-2000s by lobbying American lawmakers on behalf of Citgo Petroleum Corp.

(JUAN BARRETO/AFP/Getty Images)

One of the partners involved with the project was a Hong Kong billionaire linked to international organized crime who had ties to North Korea, the Chicago Tribune reported.

Giuliani defended the partnership, saying his firm “had nothing to do with” the billionaire and didn’t deal directly with him.

He knows the world

While Giuliani’s foreign policy background was one of his biggest weaknesses during his presidential run, he believed his security consultant role — which took him to dozens of countries — made him an expert on international relations.

“I’ve probably been in foreign lands more than any other candidate for President in the last five to six years,” he said during an April 2007 campaign stop in New Hampshire.

At the time, he hadn’t visited to Iraq, despite the United States’ ongoing conflict there.

Oh, Canadian medicine

While stumping for Trump, Giuliani insulted Canada’s healthcare system, saying that our neighbors to the north face long, possibly deadly, waits to see doctors.

Rudy Giuliani tours Mexico City in 2003.

(HENRY ROMERO/REUTERS)

“You stand in line and then you die,” he told a rally in Ocala, Fla., adding that Hillary Clinton’s plans to maintain Obamacare would create similar problems in the U.S.

“Hillary, we don’t want your socialized medicine. Take it and stuff it up …” he said before training off and mumbling. ‘I didn’t say it! I suggested it, but I didn’t say it!”

Law and order

As an international security consultant, Giuliani has taken in lots of money to promote his crime-reduction approach — focusing on security instead of social growth.

In Guatemala, he believed crime wouldn’t decrease with “school, libraries, nice neighborhoods and sports teams … you have to emphasize law enforcement,” he said, according to The Nation.

In El Salvador, he pushed for the destruction of two rival gangs — gangs which had developed in large part because of United States influence.

“Here it’s two major gangs, and these two gangs need to be annihilated,” he said.

Rudy Giuliani and Donald Trump have forged a close relationship.

(JONATHAN ERNST/REUTERS)

But leaders there have had more success in brokering a truce between the gangs — and trying to keep the peace.

Don’t use the C word

Giuliani angered the Chinese government in May 2001, after inviting Taiwan’s president to New York — then calling the island, which China considered a rebel region, a “country.”

“Taiwan is a remarkable country when you consider the size of the country, the population and what it’s able to produce,” Giuliani said.

Amid the flub and Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian’s visit, China’s foreign ministry spokesman released a statement referring to the United States “interfering in China’s internal affairs and damaging China’s interests and further undermining China-U.S. relations.”

Meet and greet

During Giuliani’s failed presidential run, he ridiculed then-Sen. Barack Obama’s openness about meeting with leaders of renegade nations without precondition — nations such as Iran, Syria, Cuba or North Korea.

“Then he went on to explain that Ronald Reagan negotiated with the communists,” Giuliani told a crowd. “I say this most respectfully: You’re not Ronald Reagan, you know?”

Rudy Giuliani has been a fierce critic of President Obama.

(YORGOS KARAHALIS/AFP/Getty Images)

“Here’s what Ronald Reagan did before he negotiated with communists,” Giuliani continued. “First he called them the evil empire. Then he took missiles, intermediate-range missiles … and he put them in European cities, and he pointed the missiles at Russian cities with names on them.

“Then he said, in a very nice way, ‘Let’s negotiate.'”

Corner man

On top of his praise for Russia, Giuliani has already played a hand in Ukrainian politics. His firm advised former boxer Vitali Klitschko in 2008 as he vied to be mayor of Kiev.

“They need a leader like you who can deal with corruption, who can deal with reform of government, which is so necessary,” Giuliani told Klitschko at the time.

While the athlete-turned-politician lost that round, he eventually was elected mayor in 2014. His relationship with Giuliani could be an asset to the U.S. — or a conflict of interest.

No thank you

Following the 9/11 attacks, a Saudi prince gave the city a check for $ 10 million for relief efforts.

Rudy Giuliani is being considered for Secretary of State under president-elect Donald Trump.

But after the prince’s publicist released a written statement about U.S. policies in the Middle East and its relationship with Palestine, Giuliani announced he was rejecting the donation.

“There is no moral equivalent for this attack,” Giuliani said at the time. “The people who did it lost any right to ask for justification when they slaughtered 5,000, 6,000 innocent people. Not only are those statements wrong, they’re part of the problem.”

Thanks Obama

Giuliani has consistently blamed President Obama and Hillary Clinton for the rise of ISIS — the terror group that was founded in 1999 and has grown in influence in recent decades.

“ISIS is filling a vacuum created by a vacuous foreign policy,” he told Fox News in November 2015. “ISIS is an Obama creation. This would not have happened.”

He later said Clinton “helped create ISIS” because of her involvement with Obama’s troop withdraw efforts in Iraq.

“She had her chance to do it. She helped create ISIS. I mean, Hillary Clinton could be considered a founding member of ISIS,” Giuliani told Bill O’Reilly.